Seeing the Big Picture

John Jannarone, editor-in-chief of IPO Edge and CorpGov, investigates last year’s price decline in the movie theater/restaurant stock, iPic Entertainment. He analyzes the fundamentals, declares the company’s next big catalyst, and reviews his price target, in this interview with Brian Price. Filmed on February 5, 2019.

Comments

Texas has 3 iPics and 13 Studio Movie Grills ("SMG"), SMG ticket prices are a 3rd of iPic, the food is both larger and cheaper, and in my families experience also better. Both serve over priced alcohol, It is true iPic does have 'some' nicer seats but if its $50+ for iPics and $30+ for SMG I'd much rather go to SMG. Of course that doesn't say anything about stock price values!

Sorry, I might have misunderstood but the numbers are not lining up for me: the Saudis alone worth $8 - on top of the rest ... then the very last sentence is about the risk - If the Saudi deal fails, then sell at $3... So that means the Saudi deal is already baked in and the rest is worthless pretty much?
I live in the Caribbean and we have a theater somewhat like the one described, maybe not quite as high end... you can only get an enjoyable experience if it's poorly attended... otherwise it is a mess - servers are blocking the view, interrupt you during the show and are confused often ...and the food smell from all over... the model might not have legs.

I have wanted to short iPic for a number of reasons. Used to really like it because it's very nice there -- pricing was around $17 in the front seats or $25 in the nicer reclining seats. Since then they remodeled and appear to be in the $30 range for the former $25 seat locations, but have replaced the $17 seats with fancy pods that are both better (reclining, and larger, and popcorn), but these better seats are still too close to the screen. So, while someone is sitting in them, I'm really not. Also, in the past you could buy snacks at the snack bar, and then carry them in -- simple, each, you get to view the selection, ect. But now, everyone is forced to order from a cashier, open a tab (with a credit card), and then go through the whole sign in, sign out system. It's a lot of commotion and while I do generally like those $25 seats, sometimes I'm just there to watch a movie and don't want the shuffle of all the service. But, they did get me in to sit in the "improved" seats that are now too close to the screen, and so I probably made their comps look good, but I wasn't happy with the product. So, I'm going to argue that these upgrades are short term good and long term bad because my other half now seems to prefer going to Harkins - a local movie theatre with no service and less upscale food offerings. Chairs are about 90% as good as iPic. iPic is still fancier, and I don't mind it, but she's just not impressed.
The food at iPic and Tanzy also wasn't coming out great. It was a very interesting and unique menu setup by someone very smart, but execution at the restaurant was poor. Food usually came out cold, service was spotty, water wasn't filtered, a Coke was $6.00 at the restaurant which is about $2.50 higher than it should be at a restaurant and then it was a fountain Coke with ice that didn't have a filter on it -- just horrible. The tea was no better. In the theater somehow the Coke was better -- in a bottle, and the ice seemed higher quality.
But, I digress. Look at the reviews for Tanzy in Scottsdale. Running at 3.5 stars which for a restaurant which is charging $19 for a plate of pasta with no real meat isn't as good as it should be. They should be delivering WOW for those prices, or they are going to have issues. They were having issues. I've eaten there perhaps 4 times including bringing guests twice because it's unique and interesting -- sure, well overpriced, but I liked the look and the taste. But, the execution was so bad and getting worse -- something you see in the reviews. And the customer count there was really dropping which was causing the staff quality to drop, and the service to drop, and ... now it's closed for remodeling. There really wasn't a need to remodel -- it's nice in there, but prices are 20% too high for Scottsdale (probably fine in NYC or California), and momentum wasn't good. They also did a menu change of late removing a lot of the unique stuff requiring preparation, and adding more simple and boring items. So, they tried to boost margins, did it, then lost customers, then lost staff, and ... yeah, it's closed "for remodeling" now.
So, don't always count me right, and I do want to short this name because their execution is just so bad for my location (Scottsdale has Tanzy plus a large bar -- the large bar died early, the snack bar is now closed, and Tanzy is closed for remodeling), but admittedly I did like the place. I just think that their "revenue growth" is short term and that reality is coming for them ... they have too much restaurant space at this location and they aren't that good at running a restaurant.